Broadway Doggie

by Nancy Krulik

  Gulp. What are we going to do?

  Wait a minute. I have an idea.

  “Stand still,” I tell Barney. “Try to look like one of these bony guys. Maybe the guards will think we belong here.”

  “That won’t work,” Barney says.

  “It worked for me in Zermatt,” I say. “I looked just like one of their ice statues. The two-legs didn’t know the difference.”

  “But—” Barney begins.

  “Do you have a better idea?” I ask him.

  Barney doesn’t answer. Instead he stands on his hind legs and tries to look like a dinosaur.

  I do the same thing.

  The guards come running. They go right past us.

  Wiggle, waggle, woo-hoo! My trick worked!

  Or maybe not. The guards turn around. They stare at Barney and me.

  “They’ve spotted us,” Barney says. “We gotta scram!”

  “Where to?” I ask.

  “You run to one side. I’ll run to the other,” Barney says. “We’ll confuse them. They won’t know which way to look.”

  That makes sense. Besides, it’s not like there’s any other choice.

  Zippity, zip, zoom! I run across the room!

  Two-legs leap out of the way as I run. They don’t want to get knocked over by a zippity, zip, zooming sheepdog puppy.

  A guard is chasing right behind me. He is shouting. I don’t understand what he’s saying.

  But I know what he wants to do. He wants to grab me. His paws are stretched out wide.

  He won’t grab me! No way!

  “Come on, paws,” I bark. “Run faster.”

  My paws speak dog. They run fast. Faster. Fastest!

  I hurry past the guard at the door.

  Down the stairs.

  And out onto the street. Whee! I’m free.

  But I don’t see Barney anywhere. Oh no! Did the guard catch him?

  I look up at the door. There’s Barney. He’s barking wildly.

  “You better get out of my way, guard!” Barney barks.

  The guard must speak dog, because he moves away and lets Barney go. He looks scared of the big barking dog in front of him.

  “We made it!” I shout happily as Barney races down the steps. “We got away!”

  “We sure did!” Barney exclaims.

  But not for long. Just then I see a group of two-legs racing down the stairs. They run faster when they spot Barney and me.

  “I knew it wouldn’t be long before those guards came looking for us,” Barney groans.

  “What are we going to do?” I ask nervously.

  “There’s only one thing to do,” Barney says. “Get out of here!”

  CHAPTER 5

  Run. Run. Run.

  My heart is thumpety, thump, thumping. My paws are hurting.

  “Can we stop now?” I ask Barney.

  “We should probably get a little farther away from the museum,” he answers. Then he looks at me. “You seem kinda tired, kid.”

  “I am,” I admit. “It’s hard to run on this hard, cold ground.”

  “Then let’s catch a cab,” Barney says.

  Huh?

  “Is that like catching a ball?” I ask him.

  Barney laughs. “Not exactly,” he says. He looks around. “Look, there’s a cab now.”

  The next thing I know, Barney is jumping into a big metal machine with round paws.

  So I jump in, too. A moment later, the machine starts moving slowly and quietly through the streets of New York City.

  “I’ve never been in a metal machine like this one,” I tell Barney. “Josh’s machine makes a vroom-vroom noise when it moves. But this one doesn’t.”

  “This is a different kind of metal machine,” Barney says. “It’s very quiet. The two-leg in the front has to move his legs up and down to make it go.”

  “That seems like a lot of work,” I say. “Doesn’t he get tired?”

  “I don’t know,” Barney admits. “At least we’re not getting tired.”

  That’s true. Barney and I aren’t doing anything. We’re just riding along the streets of New York.

  “Keep your head under the blanket,” Barney warns me. “If the two-leg up front sees us, he’ll throw us out.”

  “But I want to see New York,” I tell him.

  “Don’t worry, kid, you will,” Barney assures me. “You’re with the best tour guide in the city—me.”

  Suddenly the metal machine stops. Someone whips off the blanket.

  There are two two-legs standing there. They sure look surprised.

  I guess they didn’t expect to see dogs hidden under the blanket.

  The two-leg in the front of the metal machine turns around. He starts to yell.

  “Time to leave,” Barney says.

  Barney leaps out of the metal machine. So do I.

  I follow him down some stairs. Barney runs fast. It is hard to keep up with him.

  I’m zoomity, zoom, zooming down the stairs. My paws are moving fast. Fast. Faster . . . WHOA!

  This ground is slippery-slidey.

  Whoosh . . . I slide across the ground on my belly! Wiggle, waggle, yikes! The ground is cold!

  My legs try to stand up. But my paws keep slipping out from under me. Whoaaa! I’m sliding all over the place.

  Two-legs leap out of the way as I slide.

  Bang! I slide right into a wall. That hurt.

  I look up. There’s Barney. But he’s not slipping. Or sliding. He’s moving around in circles. Kind of like some of the two-legs are doing.

  Now he’s walking . . . backward! One of the two-legs is walking with him.

  “How do you do that?” I bark to Barney.

  Barney doesn’t answer. He just walks around in a circle again.

  A group of two-legs are watching Barney. They are hitting their paws together. And smiling. Barney is making all the two-legs happy.

  Well, almost all the two-legs. There’s a group of angry-looking two-legs running down the stairs. They race onto the slippery-slidey cold ground and start to chase Barney and me.

  “Show’s over, Sparky,” Barney calls to me. “We gotta get out of here!”

  Barney runs across the slippery-slidey ground and races up the stairs. It seems easy for him.

  But it’s not easy for me. I run two steps. Then I fall.

  “Hurry, Sparky!” Barney shouts. “You don’t want to be taken to the pound!”

  “I’m trying,” I bark. But it’s hard to hurry when you keep falling.

  Run. Fall.

  Run. Fall.

  The two-legs are getting closer.

  Run. Fall. Run.

  Finally, I reach the stairs.

  “Follow me!” Barney shouts as I run up the stairs.

  A moment later, we are all alone on a small, narrow street. Just me and Barney.

  “That was a close one,” Barney says.

  I try to catch my breath.

  “That ground sure was slippery,” I say finally. “I couldn’t walk. But you were amazing.”

  Barney smiles. “Thanks, pal,” he says.

  “You made those two-legs really happy,” I tell him. “Was that acting?”

  Barney shakes his head. “Nah,” he says. “That was skating.”

  All of a sudden my teeth start moving up and down. Only I’m not eating. Or talking. I’m just cold.

  “I wish I had that blanket now,” I tell Barney.

  “Yeah, it’s pretty chilly out. We should—”

  Suddenly Barney stops talking. His ears perk up.

  “Uh-oh,” he says. “The two-legs are coming this way. We gotta find a better place to hide.”

  “But this is a good hiding place,” I tell him. “We’re the only ones here
.”

  “That’s what makes it a rotten hiding place,” Barney explains. “In New York, the best place to hide is in a crowd. And I know where we can find the biggest crowds of all!”

  CHAPTER 6

  There are two-legs in front of me.

  There are two-legs behind me.

  There are two-legs all around me.

  I’ve never seen so many two-legs. There are so many, I can barely move. It’s kind of scary.

  “Welcome to Times Square, Sparky,” Barney says. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  I can’t see if it’s beautiful. All I can see are legs.

  “Come on,” Barney says. “I want to show you something special.”

  Barney starts to walk, so I do, too. I stay really, really close to him. My nose is practically touching his tail. I don’t want to get lost in this crowd.

  Suddenly, Barney stops walking. He looks up. “Isn’t this amazing?” he asks me.

  I look up. But I don’t see anything amazing. “It’s just a building,” I say.

  Barney stares at me. He seems surprised. “It’s not just any building,” he tells me. “It’s a Broadway theater.”

  Oh. Now I get it.

  “Every visitor to New York City should go see a Broadway theater,” Barney says proudly.

  “What does it look like on the inside?” I ask him.

  Barney shrugs. “I don’t know. I’ve never been inside. But I will be. One day, two-legs will come from all over to watch me do my tricks. They will cheer when I sit. And lie down. And dance on my hind legs. And roll over.”

  I watch as Barney sits. And lies down. And dances. And rolls over.

  I wonder if Barney had to go to school to learn those tricks. That’s where I learned them.

  A crowd of two-legs walks by. Barney leaps up on his hind legs and twirls around. They don’t even notice. They’re too busy walking by.

  Barney looks sad.

  “You would have made them smile if we were inside,” I say. “It is too cold out here for anyone to be happy.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Barney agrees. “It is cold. Come on. I’ll show you a great place to warm up.”

  Barney and I go around the corner.

  I sure hope he’s taking me to a nice warm house. Maybe one with a comfy couch. And some yummy treats. That would be perfect.

  Barney stops in front of a building.

  My tail starts to wag. It thinks we’re going inside. That makes my tail very happy.

  Barney plops down on top of some metal bars in the middle of the sidewalk.

  “Aaaahhhh,” Barney sighs. “My favorite grate.”

  My tail stops wagging. “It doesn’t look so great to me,” I say.

  Barney gives me a funny look. Then he laughs.

  “No, it’s a grate. A break in the sidewalk. There’s hot air coming up from down there.”

  I guess it’s worth a try. I am awfully cold.

  Slowly, I sit down on the metal bars. Hot air hits me right on the rear end.

  “This is nice,” I say.

  “Told ya,” Barney says. “And the best part is, from here we can see everything going on in Times Square.”

  There sure is a lot going on. There are lots of metal machines with round paws. And two-legs are zoomity, zoom, zooming all around. And . . .

  Coo . . . coo . . . coo.

  Pigeons! The Ferocious Flyers are back!

  Coo . . . coo . . . coo.

  “What do they want now?” I ask Barney.

  “I think they want to warm up over this grate,” Barney says. “But that’s not happening. We were here first.”

  Barney sits up tall. “Get outta here,” he growls at the pigeons. “Go find your own warm grate. Maybe over in Jersey.”

  When Barney growls, he sounds really scary.

  But I don’t think the Ferocious Flyers are scared. Because a whole bunch more of them are flying over us now. There are so many pigeons, I can barely see the sky.

  “Hey!” I shout as I jump out of the way of a big blob of falling bird poop. “That’s not nice!”

  Coo . . . coo . . . coo.

  The pigeons sound like they are laughing at me. Just like the squirrels in my yard.

  Grrr.

  “It’s easy for them to win a fight,” I tell Barney. “They’re way up there where we can’t reach them. If I could fly, I’d show them.”

  Barney starts to smile. “That’s a great idea,” he says.

  “What are you talking about?” I ask him. “Dogs can’t fly.”

  “No,” Barney admits. “But we can do the next best thing!”

  CHAPTER 7

  Uh-oh.

  Barney and I have just walked into a big room. The door has shut, tight. We’re locked in here with a whole bunch of two-legs. But that’s not the uh-oh part.

  The uh-oh part is that the room is moving. It’s going up, up, up.

  Barney and I are locked in a moving room with a bunch of two-leg strangers.

  The two-leg strangers don’t look too happy to be locked in here with us, either. They’ve all moved to one corner of the room. They’re pointing at us. And they aren’t smiling.

  “What’s going on?” I ask Barney nervously.

  “You said you wanted to fly,” Barney tells me. “This is as close as it gets.”

  “I didn’t say I wanted to fly,” I remind him. “I said if I could fly.”

  “Same thing,” Barney says. “When we get out of here, we’re going to be high up in the sky. Just like the Ferocious Flyers.”

  Gulp. I’ve been high up before. At the top of the Washington Monument in Washington, DC. It was really scary up there.

  Just then, the room stops moving up, up, up. The door opens. The two-legs run out. They can’t get away from us fast enough.

  “Come on, Sparky,” Barney says. “You’re gonna love this.”

  I follow Barney out of the room. Whoosh! A blast of cold air hits me right in the face.

  “I-I-I want to go back in the room that moves up, up, up,” I tell Barney. “I want it to take me down, down, down.”

  “Come on, Sparky. Just check this out,” Barney urges.

  I walk over to where Barney is standing. I look out. Then I look down . . .

  Uh-oh. I shouldn’t have done that. Now I know how far away the ground is. Very far away.

  The metal machines with four round paws are so far away, they look like chew toys. And the two-legs are so tiny, they look like I could swallow them up in one gulp.

  Out there in the distance, I see one two-leg. She looks bigger than the others. She’s a funny green color. And she’s standing right in the middle of a giant bowl of water.

  “What kind of two-leg—?” I start. But I don’t get to finish my question. Because just then, I hear a lot of shouting.

  It’s two-leg shouting, so I can’t understand what they’re saying. But I get the feeling that they’re yelling at Barney and me.

  “We gotta get out of here,” Barney says. “Those could be dogcatchers.”

  “D-d-dogcatchers?” I ask Barney nervously.

  “Dogs aren’t really allowed on the observation deck of the Empire State Building,” Barney says.

  Now he tells me.

  Coo . . . coo . . . coo.

  As if things weren’t bad enough, the Ferocious Flyers have arrived.

  “Get out of here,” Barney growls at the birds, “before I bite off your tail feathers.”

  That scares those birds away real fast. They fly off.

  “The Ferocious Flyers are such chickens,” Barney says with a laugh.

  “I thought they were pigeons?” I say.

  Barney gives me a look.

  The dogcatchers aren’t afraid of Barney’s bark. They’re still coming right for
us.

  I run to the room that moved up, up, up. But the door is shut. We can’t escape that way.

  “Let’s go, Sparky,” Barney tells me. “We gotta take the stairs.”

  “Stairs?” I ask him. “From all the way up here?”

  “We have no choice,” Barney says. He starts running down the stairs. I follow close behind.

  Thump, thump. Thump, thump.

  Uh-oh. Now I can hear two-legs running down the stairs behind us. So I run faster. So does Barney.

  “I don’t get why dogs aren’t allowed in this building, but pigeons are,” I say as we run. “Pigeons are mean. They don’t cuddle with two-legs. They don’t do tricks.”

  “I know,” Barney agrees. “Pigeons are the ones that should be put in pounds!”

  Barney and I have been running down a lot of stairs. My paws hurt. My tongue is hanging out of my mouth.

  I’m running down the stairs so fast, my fur flies in my eyes. I can’t see a thing. But I keep running. Fast. Faster. Fastest.

  Thud.

  Wiggle, waggle, uh-oh!

  I run right into a two-leg.

  The two-leg wraps his paws around my middle. He lifts me off the ground.

  “Barney! Help!” I bark as loud as I can.

  Barney doesn’t answer.

  I wiggle and squiggle. “Let go of me, two-leg!” I bark.

  But the two-leg holds me tighter. I can’t break free. This is baddy, bad, bad.

  “Don’t take me to the pound!” I bark to the two-leg. “Please don’t!”

  CHAPTER 8

  “What is this place?” I ask.

  The strong two-leg has dropped me in a huge room full of dogs. Big dogs. Little dogs. Puppies. Grown-up dogs.

  Dogs are everywhere.

  Some are resting on pillows.

  Some are chewing toys.

  Some are licking their paws.

  Everywhere I look, there’s another dog.

  A furry mixed breed looks up at me. “You’re at a shelter,” she tells me.

  “A what?” I ask her.